A year ago today, Think Simple Now was launched with the intention of sharing some of my lessons learned on personal development. The audience was originally intended to be only my family and friends. That circle of friends quickly expanded around the world, to people in 197 countries, and grew beyond any of my expectations.

My original goal was simply to have 100 subscribers. Today, I am proud to be writing for 9000 RSS subscribers and 200,000 (smart and good looking *smiles*) readers who frequent the site each month. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you for trusting me with your valuable time. Thank you for your continuous encouragement and support.

Not only have my dreams come true, I am deeply in-love with working on this site. Words cannot express the state of blissful flow I experience when creating new content.

A Journey to Arabic China

I am currently in China on a five week trip and will be spending half of the time in Beijing and the other half In the XinJiang Province. XinJiang is also known as Turkistan China, where a mixture of 19 different ethnic groups co-inhabit a region graced with vast deserts as well as some of the world’s highest mountains.

If you’re interested, you can follow my personal blog at Simply Tina. I will be updating it with pictures and words as Internet access will allow (Subscribe to the RSS feed).

Photo of Gala Darling. One of the most outstanding people who I admire.
If you do what you love to do, then you won't do it in an average way.~Angela Bassett

Are you exceptional in your line of work? Do you love what you do? Perhaps that’s why you are or aren’t getting the results you want.

People who consistently achieve outstanding results all have this in common: they are passionate about what they do. It’s no longer work, but an active participation of joy and creativity.

This article takes a deeper look into outstanding performance, and gives guidance as to how you can manifest outstanding results in your life.

First, I’ll start with a slice from my own experience:

Five years of my life was spent in University getting a Math and Computer Science degree so that I could get a high-tech job with guaranteed security. School was tough and flew by quickly. After battling it out with other competitors chasing after the same jobs, I got what I wanted and landed in Seattle.

Very soon after, I realized that I wasn’t that great at programming software, nor was I very interested in it. I got my job done, but I felt that I had to work extra hard just to keep up with my peers. I longed to fit-in with other engineers and felt like a sore thumb sticking out in the crowd. “One day, they’re gonna find out…” I used to tell myself during the first six months on the job.

I knew better. I knew that I wasn’t average. I knew that my best was excellent. I pulled long hours, worked on weekends, was addicted to caffeine, and within a few month, I developed an immune system disorder called Psoriasis Rosea from stress. It was the drive to be outstanding, in a position that wasn’t fit for me or my interests which brought me to this low point.

I recently sat down with several highly enthusiastic achievers, all of whom have many ambitions. These casual chats revolved around the theme of, “How do I turn my ambitions into reality?”

I deeply admired their energy and drive, but it became clear as to why they were not seeing their desired results: Trying to do too much at once.

Despite the social illusion that we can have it all, we only have a limited amount of energy and time. Even if we think we can achieve it all during our heightened state of enthusiasm and inspiration, when reality hits, we’ll find that striving to achieve it allat once will result in exhaustion and disconnection with our inner selves.

Instead of striving to achieve it all, how about striving to achieve what’s most important to us? How about striving to be fulfilled and happy? How about striving for personal wellbeing and meaning?